OFFSTAGE: See Vintage Taylor Swift Pictures

(CMT Offstage keeps a 24/7 watch on everything that’s happening with country music artists behind the scenes and out of the spotlight.)

USA Today has been hanging onto this picture of Taylor Swift for almost six years. It’s her at the CMA Awards in November 2006 in a tight black satin dress and long (like up past her elbows) black gloves. Why the long wait? They don’t say. The caption just reads, “This photograph has never been published until now.” But it’s part of a very thorough gallery of old and new pictures of Swift through the years.
Some I’m sure you have seen, especially more recent red carpet pictures. But some will be new to you. I’d never see the one from the 2007 CMA Awards where she won the Horizon Award at age 17. “This is definitely the highlight of my senior year,” she said when she accepted it. Then there are a few good shots from a locker room photo shoot at LP Field during the 2008 CMA Music Festival and one of her from the same year — in plaid tights — talking on the phone and hanging out with her mom while she waited to perform on the Late Show With David Letterman. And there’s one from a press conference before the 2009 CMA Music Festival, where she told reporters, “I sign a lot of interesting things, like a turtle shell with my face painted on it. That was the winning touch.”